Where did Baggins Money come from?

[Barliman Butterbur]

In FoTR, Chapter 1: A Long-expected Party, there is constant reference to Bilbo's alleged wealth, treasures he supposedly brought back from his journey to the Lonely Mountain. However, even though Bilbo gives out tons of gifts to everyone, there is not even a penny to be found among these items. Still, the majority of the hobbit population persists in their belief that there must be dozens of tunnels full of gems and gold in Bag End hill.

How much truth do you think there was to these rumours?

I believe I recall reading about Bilbo giving Sam a small bag of gold, referring to it as "almost the last drop of the Smaug vintage." For me, that says it all.

Barley

...don't forget that Bilbo's real wealth was something neither himself nor any hobbit would realize: The Mithril coat.

Excellent point! What happened to it after Bilbo and Frodo sailed into the West? Did it stay behind in the Shire in Sam's keeping? Did Frodo take it with him?

Barley

 

[morgoth_1907]

But he then got at least some gold...just maybe not as much as he might've.

Yes he have. Remember armor made from mithril. He gave it to Frodo only for his "journey". He could take it back.

 

[Wolfshead]

But consider this: Caernarvon Castle was completed in the early 1300s for about £22,000. So Bilbo had roughly the equivalent of 10 or 12 Caernarvon Castles. (Steven Muhlberger in the On-Line Reference Books for Medieval Studies says that, “Edward III, one of the richer monarchs of the time, had a normal yearly revenue of no more than £30,000 a year.” Edward III built Caernarvon Castle.)

Ah well, y'see, I happen to know it was Edward I that built Caernarvon Castle, for £22,000 - more than a years treasury income. You would have got away with it had Edward I's son, Edward II, not been known later as Edward Caernarvon, which suggests a connection with the castle. It was later believed Edward II was born there, but there's no contempory evidence to suggest it.

Indeed, your source even says it was Edward I.

Take, for instance, the big, well-designed castles that Edward I built to control Wales. Just one of these, Caernarfon Castle, cost £20-25,000 between 1284 and 1330, when it was essentially finished. This is as if Canada had bought a small fleet of submarines, each of which cost 80 billion dollars. Caernarfon Castle was exceptional, but not unique.

I'm sorry, but I'm a history student and probably know too much

 

[Erestor Arcamen]

wouldn't the real wealth be, even though he didn't get it from the dwarves, the One Ring? I mean this ring was the bane of Isildur, the one thing that, if Sauron regained it, Middle Earth as he knew it, would be dessimated. The Ring was worth more than anything under the Lonely Mountain. If that Ring got into the wrong hands, then Middle Earth as the Hobbits and Dwarves and Gandalf knew it would be no more.

 

[Alcuin]

Ah well, y'see, I happen to know it was Edward I that built Caernarvon Castle, for £22,000 - more than a years treasury income. ... Indeed, your source even says it was Edward I.

How sloppy of me! You are correct.

I'm sorry, but I'm a history student and probably know too much

Don't be.

 

[Wolfshead]

How sloppy of me! You are correct.

Don't be.

Haha, I'm not really sorry I'm a pedant really...

 

[Alcuin]

I’m a pedant really...

Good! So am I.

Of course, the whole business of the gold from Smaug’s hoard overlooks what might have been salvaged from the trolls, which Aragorn and the hobbits found buried north of the road after Weathertop, doesn’t it?

 

[Gothmog]

Of course, the whole business of the gold from Smaug’s hoard overlooks what might have been salvaged from the trolls, which Aragorn and the hobbits found buried north of the road after Weathertop, doesn’t it?

This was the subject of my post no 6 above. Perhaps you missed it as I think you were posting at the same time.

 

[Helcaraxë]

Even after his Dragon-procured wealth was spent, though, Bilbo still had assets; for instance, Bag End, the probably endless supply of good, expensive wines, his property and lots, the multitude of strange and wondrous things floating about his hobbit hole, and perhaps the profits from his translations could have made him rich in and of themselves.

 

[Goldilocks Gamgee]

I was recently listening to a Lord of the Rings audiobook that I found (side note: it's read by Phil Dragash and has Howard Shore's music from the trilogy, making it absolutely epic), and I found something that -- no matter how I spin it -- I cannot seem to explain. We are told throughout the book that "as Mr. Baggins was generous with his money, most people were willing to forgive him his oddities and his good fortune," and that "Mr. Bilbo is free with his money, and there seems no lack of it", and so forth, but there is never any explanation given as to where this money flows from. Later on in the book, when Merry asks Frodo how much is still left of the treasures Bilbo brought back from his adventures, Frodo replies that, "None at all... Bilbo gave it all away. He told me he did not feel it was really his, as it came from robbers."

So, my question is, where did the Baggins money come from?

 

[d4rk3lf]

From what I understand (or misunderstand), the money he brought back from adventures was so large, that he only needed very small percentage from it for living (maybe 2% to 5%), and the rest of the money he spent, over the years... giving it away, and helping other hobbits, and not asking anything back...
Right around his 111 birthday, and his departure to Rivendell, he pretty much spent it all (and this is what Frodo meant, I think).

 

[Deimos]

From what I understand (or misunderstand), the money he brought back from adventures was so large, that he only needed very small percentage from it for living (maybe 2% to 5%), and the rest of the money he spent, over the years... giving it away, and helping other hobbits, and not asking anything back...
Right around his 111 birthday, and his departure to Rivendell, he pretty much spent it all (and this is what Frodo meant, I think).

Don't forget he gave the last of the "Smaug vintage" to Sam as a kind of early wedding present, even tho' this was long before Sam proposed to Rosie.
(And Sam blushed when Bilbo mentioned it thusly)

 

[Starbrow]

I always assumed that Bilbo was a landowner and earned money through renting his land to farmers. He was living comfortably on something before he brought back any treasure.

 

[Olorgando]

TH chapter 18 "The Return Journey" near the end (p. 351 in my 2001 hardcover version of the 1998 HarperCollins paperback):

"In the end {Bilbo} would only take two small chests, one filled with silver, and the other with gold, such as one strong pony could carry."

Chapter 19 "The Last Stage":

"Not far from the road they found the gold of the trolls, which they had buried, still hidden and untouched. "I have enough to last me my time," said Bilbo, when they had dug it up. "You had better take this, Gandalf. I dare say you can find a use for it."
"Indeed I can!" said the wizard. "But share and share alike! You may find that you have more needs than you expect."

Gold and silver, but no mention of coins. But considering the time in, and the audience for, which TH was published, (treasure) chests were usually thought of as being filled with just that - coins. A few jewels scattered among the coins, perhaps, but unlikely the ingots or whatever that was the form in which precious metals were traded before the first historically verified coinage, from Asia Minor (present-day Turkey) roughly around 500 BC.

When you consider that pennies in the 14th-century British coinage were made of silver, and gold coins started at 240 (or 252) pennies (12 pennies per shilling, 20 shillings per pound sterling (silver) (or 21 shillings for the "sovereign")), Bilbo certainly had a big "bank account" when he returned from Erebor in 2942 Third Age. Up to his 111th birthday, 'tis true, he had over 59 years to distribute this - though the "robbers's" part can only mean the trolls' gold.

 

[Deimos]

I always assumed that Bilbo was a landowner and earned money through renting his land to farmers. He was living comfortably on something before he brought back any treasure.

I also I thought the Baggins' were landed gentry, as in "old money".
If that is true, he was already well-to-do.
He may not have even needed his land worked any longer to bring in money, or perhaps minimally so. .

 

[d4rk3lf]

With ring in his possession, he could've bought all the lands and hire all the hobbits to work on these lands for miserable wages.
Then he could recruit Dunedains as his personal army, and spread his power to south-east empty lands. After 20-30 years, and population boom (if in average 1 dunedain have 10 children, that's like 5 times larger army), and he would be ready to invade Rivendell.
After 5 years of relative peace, he could have agree with Saruman and Rohirims (lead by Wormtongue) to make collision, and attack Lothlorien, and make Gomdor a Vasal state.
He could then offer to Thranduil and Dain either to be his vasal states, or to destroy them.
Finally, he would be in front of the gates of Mordor, with insane large army, and defeat Sauron (half of the orcs would switch sides before that anyway)
And he could rule the middle earth.

 

[Muskrat]

“Gold” and “silver” are often slang for money and are understood as such. In Spanish “dinero,” silver still means money. I assume the trills gold and silver WAS money.

 

[buckleburyferry]

I was recently listening to a Lord of the Rings audiobook that I found (side note: it's read by Phil Dragash and has Howard Shore's music from the trilogy, making it absolutely epic), and I found something that -- no matter how I spin it -- I cannot seem to explain. We are told throughout the book that "as Mr. Baggins was generous with his money, most people were willing to forgive him his oddities and his good fortune," and that "Mr. Bilbo is free with his money, and there seems no lack of it", and so forth, but there is never any explanation given as to where this money flows from. Later on in the book, when Merry asks Frodo how much is still left of the treasures Bilbo brought back from his adventures, Frodo replies that, "None at all... Bilbo gave it all away. He told me he did not feel it was really his, as it came from robbers."

So, my question is, where did the Baggins money come from?

Which Audio book if I may ask? I know of the one by Rob Inglis

 

[Deimos]

“Gold” and “silver” are often slang for money and are understood as such. In Spanish “dinero,” silver still means money. I assume the trills gold and silver WAS money.

Even if it weren't ---if it were, say, ingots--it could be bartered for money or goods.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

I also I thought the Baggins' were landed gentry, as in "old money".
If that is true, he was already well-to-do.
He may not have even needed his land worked any longer to bring in money, or perhaps minimally so. .

A couple of quotes from "An Unexpected Party":

This hobbit was a very well-to-do hobbit, and his name was Baggins. The Bagginses had lived in the neighborhood of the Hill for time out of mind, and people considered them very respectable not only because most of them were rich . . .

Bungo, that was Bilbo's father, built the most luxurious hobbit-hole for her (and partly with her money) that was to be found either under the Hill or over the Hill or across the Water . . .

That last meaning it even outdid anything in the Tooklands.